Isabel's Song
by AlexJ
Summary: Truth is beautiful, but then again, so are lies. Which betrayal hurts more?
1. Prologue

Title: Isabel's Song

Author:  AlexJ

Summary: While I sort out my 'epic', I thought I'd try my hand at some not so typical angst, could sort of be considered a spin off to VUV but can be read separately. 

Timeline: AU, but will stick pretty close to the show

Disclaimer: Don't own anything connected to _Alias _

Feedback Gratefully accepted feeling kind of down because I accidentally deleted my 'baby' so cheer me up   =)

_AN: _A lot darker then my previous work simply because I wanted to try it. Contains references to Russian Orphanages. My dedication is to every child who suffers in this troubled world. __

P.S. As always to my betas  'GG' and Ducks   

***

Prologue

_Poetic justice is nothing but a sentimental lie._

Russia: unknown location out Moscow, 1982 

"Miss Acarlin?' 

Dr. Nicholas Kiln had seen many mothers in his time.  Quite a few of them resembled the composed woman in front of him, graceful with the tall silhouette of a born dancer. Nothing truly surprised him anymore; everyone who came through the doors was there for the same purpose, be it the shunted child of an official or the sagging mother of seven.  Despite the massive gulf that had doubtlessly separated them all their lives, they were united in this. 

Still, he felt the stirring of curiosity. 

Regardless of their origin, they all looked more or less the same, or a variation of a common theme. All were tired, although nowadays that was countrywide. Some were pale and gaunt, while others, momentarily warmed by surging emotion, flushed. A few tried to appear chilling with disdainful relief, but Nicholas had become a reluctant expert at reading the emotion behind the malnourished features.

It was usual for them to be accompanied by a male to guarantee the offending woman wasn't gripped by a sudden sentiment.  

The woman in front of him fit into none of his subconscious categories. 

She was tall, effortlessly graceful. Her features lacked timeworn lines poorly concealed by cheap makeup. Under nondescript garments, his clinical training noted athletically toned limbs. The brown eyes were emotionless.  The feelings weren't concealed; they weren't there. 

The veteran doctor cleared a suddenly dry throat.  "Kara Acarlin?" by way of classification. Receiving only a curt nod, he passed the flimsy clipboard across the desk. 

"You are aware that you are terminating all rights in regarded to this matter?" he asked with monotonous formally. The rights were rarely heeded or wanted; a verbal agreement seemed to make it more real, but the last thing the under funded, cash strapped, barely legal facility needed was another lawsuit.  

"Yes"

"Then you are free to go" 

Long, distinctly feminine fingers didn't shake as they signed the form. Unlike the others, she made no noise as she left without looking back.

***

The sound of the side door to the exam room opening jerked the oddly dazed man out of reverie.  Sister Angelina, the matron who was also the only nurse strolled in, her high heals clicking sharply on the chipped tiles. 

"Looks healthy," she observed, her accent thick and heavy.  "It's a good thing too, she'll go quickly.  We can't afford more."

What she meant was that children without obvious health problems got adopted faster. The ones that didn't bang themselves against the wall, or scream when touched. If they had only enough 'orphan' qualities to be portrayed on "20/20" they stood a chance. Nicholas nodded briefly, scanning over her meticulous report as he did so. 

**Sex: Female **

**Weight: 6 pounds **

**Heart/Lungs: Good**

**Organs: Good **

**Abuse/ Drugs: None**

Birth marks: none distinguished

"Did the mother leave anything?" he asked, brow still furrowed over the more specific medical details. 

Angelina was stocking the round trolley and she did not look up from filling a syringe. "Yes, nothing much, it's in there with her."  She bent down to the drugs cupboard, murmuring, "It's a shame"

Nicholas entered the exam room quietly. The only sound was the soft beep of the newly installed heart monitor. It was the only piece of technology in the room, proudly sponsored by some nameless senator wanting to increases his charity profile. The light was dim in accordance with the faulty generator, and the nearly permanent smell of antiseptic was heavy. Walking over to the cot in the centre of the room, the doctor peered inside. 

For some reason, he had suddenly developed the notion that the child of the remarkable woman would look different somehow, special. The infant looked like all the hundreds he had treated. Small and wrinkled showing the earliest signs of hair. Around her tightly clenched fist was a plastic bracelet that showed the room she would be placed in: 2B, the ward for the healthy children who needed nothing but the normal tending. 

He caught sight of a small pouch on the set of drawers.  Picking it up carefully, the doctor tipped the contents onto his calloused palm. A sliver bracelet shone in the distorted sunlight. Angelina was wrong. Very few people he saw could afford something of such quality. 

"Jacqueline" was engraved on the flipside.  

So now the baby was special, at least to a certain extent. 

She had name. 

**

Laura wanted to cry. 

That in its self wasn't unusual.  Laura Bristow was the overly sentimental professor, fond of Shakespearean drama. If she existed anymore, Laura Bristow would be sobbing. If she existed anymore, Laura Bristow would never have left her child in a remote orphanage in Russia. If she existed anymore, Laura wouldn't be able think, her brilliant mind clouded by pointless emotion.

It was a good thing she didn't exist anymore.

Irina wasn't immune to crying. She had cried when Alexander forced her to learn seduction techniques at fifteen. She sobbed after killing her first innocent, a twelve-year old son of a diplomat. Most recently, she had experienced incapacitating pain after saying good night to her daughter for the very last time. 

What was different about this situation was that, for the first time in her life, Irina's heart was breaking of its own accord.  


	2. Chapter One

Chapter One  
  
He was dead.  
  
That was what all the best minds in the agency could figure out. The doctors huddled around, conferring about what question would bring Jack Bristow back from his emotionless, machine-like state. What they didn't realize was that Jack Bristow had being dying since the day he meet Irina Derevko.  
  
When they first met, he had lost all desire to pursue his long time infatuation with the most sought after woman, Sara Robson.  
  
On their first date, he had spontaneously lost all desire to converse with the many women who tried to date him.  
  
Kissing her had caused him to lose the warnings that were just beginning to be slipped into training. "Never give too much of yourself away" was his mentors favourite phrase.  
  
Sex had caused the death of all ambition except to prove worthy of her and built a life that would give her everything.  
  
Marrying Laura had resulted in the death of any respect his aristocratic, dictatorial family had for him. Their good opinion, once so valued, couldn't have counted for less when it came to his connectionless bride.  
  
The birth of Sydney, he could honesty say, had been the happiest day of his life. He had sat for hours simply admiring the beautiful angel he had help to create. While Laura rested, he had read every possibly book on fatherhood. Jack Bristow wanted to be the best father in the world. After all, she already had the perfect mother.  
  
Lies.  
  
The Jack Bristow everybody was so frantically searching for had been killed long ago. His dedication to the agency was the only part that Irina hadn't tainted.  
  
The irony would have broken his heart, if it hadn't already shattered into a million pieces. 


	3. Chapter Two

Chapter Two-Shades of Truth 

Saint Luke Orphanage                                 6 May 1988 

This was where the definitive answer lay. 

Alexander Khasinau was trying to make the frustratingly incalculable decision whether he wanted to find it. Keeping a habitually straight back, the former doctor let out a tense breath, forcefully unclenching his fists. 

Could it be possible that his former charge could have betrayed him so completely?

Betrayal was far too strong a word. Their relationship was based on mutual exploitation. He had brought her up from obscurity, crafting Irina Derevko's brilliance for his own designs. She in turn had surpassed him with ruthless cunning, rising through the ranks displaying clinical efficiency. Alexander had once given himself credit for creating the 'man;' it was not without bitter emotions that he admitted to being nothing more than a useful starting pawn in a true mastermind's game. 

If he could not claim to have her, he could at least claim to _know_ her. Khasinau had spent years analysing and critiquing her every gesture, mapping out and anticipating responses. Perfecting the already talented deceiver was how he discovered the truth after a then unknown catalyst.

It had begun with the pooled talents of the techs doing a slandered    systems overhaul. Following his explicit instructions, the team of 12 was reconfiguring the entire mainframe, in carefully individualized sections. 

He had been sipping his morning coffee when the pasty-faced man had cowered at his door, clutching a file of papers uncertainly. 

"Dr. Khasinau?" the timid query was followed by his hesitant pause in front of his superior's desk; all this was prefaced by erratic breathing and profuse sweating. "Is the resequencing complete?" Alexander demanded, observing the man's fear but not commenting on it. "No…I've found something you may be interested in"  
  

_Khasinau took the offered report from trembling hands impatiently. _

_"The report specifies the transaction of $500..uh American per month to the account of Dr. Nicholas Klin… I did some investigation, this man runs a remote privately founded orphanage outside Moscow"_

_The tech's ramble was quite pointless. Everything was there in black and white. It was his experience that people revealed things during apprehensive rambles that they would not disclose under normal circumstances._

_"Is this budgeted?" he asked, already suspecting that it wasn't. _

"No, the only connection I can make is Kara Acarlin, which was one of Ms Derevko's pseudonyms which is why it showed up as an anomaly in systems."  The last part was said at hurried stuttering intervals.

"Does anybody know about this?" 

"Nobody sir… It was only my program that caught it."  No pride laced the statement and the man was looking precariously close to fainting. 

"Keep it that way."

The concluding pieces of the puzzle had been relatively easy to find.  Once he had dug a little deeper into Irina's voluntary reintegration    process, Khasinau had come across several inconsistencies. First, the reports sent from St. Petersburg were sporadic and lacked her usual detail.  Closer inspection of fanatical records had shown the paying of a qualified midwife under the guise of physical examiner. Most telling of was the 3 months of complete com blackout, which was only broken by her unscheduled return. 

The only thing he'd questioned at the time was the newness of the still pink scars from her surgery to remove evidence of her pregnancy but it had faded when he saw the sheer volume of intel she had accumulated first hand. 

He should have questioned further. 

Idiotically the first thing he had felt was jealousy. Jealousy that Irina had given her body to Bristow without scheduling it or even reporting her actions. Jealousy that he had apparently been so far from her mind that she had forgotten to take her rigorously ordered birth pills.  For some obscure reason, he could not stop thinking about the tenderness she would have doubtlessly given to Bristow. He doubted that Irina could have successfully distinguished between her roles anymore. 

Or if she really wanted to.

He was about to view the unknown product of that unclear line.   

Jack and Laura Bristow had conceived a second unplanned child. 

After getting over his primal sense of possession Khasinu had stopped to consider the potential benefits. A great loss to him had always been Irina's age of recruitment. She was already too independent. Having a child with Irina and, he reluctantly admitted, Bristow's intellect while still at an impressionable age could be of incalculable advantage to him.    

If the child proved to be a disappointment she could still be useful leverage. 

**

Nicholas was nervous.

Beside him Izabel was doing a far more creditable job of concealing any potential emotions. The child was impassive and calm. Her pale hands were clasped over newly purchased track pants. A sender frame showed no obvious signs of tension and blue eyes were regarding him quizzically. 

He really wanted this to work out. The girl who had renounced her birth name stubbornly had endeared herself to him. She was impossibly bright; to the extent that he had used some of her "blood money," as it was colloquially referred to, buy textbooks, much to the disapproval of the long-suffering matron. As well as being intelligent, her compassion was amazing. Izzy had insisted, using her rapidly expanding English vocabulary, that she would help care for the bedridden children. 

 Her chosen name had come from the shadow puppets she created for them. "Izabel," the magical healer. She had declared that her birth name was like Jako's, the butcher's son aka the mean bully. 

Nicholas had made the unusual decision to thoroughly screen the person that had applied to adopt her, acutely aware of the dangers Izzy could face. He had received glowing, or albeit surprised, recommendations from the people he contacted. When he had visited the home he had found a wealthy couple eager to adopt; not trusting the public channels, they had gone to an influential friend who knew of his work. While he would love to be able to look into every family, it realistically was not possible. 

The doctor had never met the patriarch of the family. 

Christopher Majink.

The man who would be taking Izbel to her new home.

"You ready, Iz?" 

She nodded, her eyes fixed on the figure approaching the entrance. 

He was nondescript. Short brown hair, lightly flecked with grey, gave way to sharp eyes and stern features. His posture spoke of confidence carried by an almost military correctness; Nicholas could not help the fleeting thought that his smile, while not particularly forced, was not natural either. 

"Dr. Klin I presume?" The man's grip was firm with just the right amount of softness. 

"I'm assuming, since we've gotten to this stage, that everything is in order?" A note of concern was evident in his voice. 

"More then adequate, Mr. Majink. If it is alright with you, Izabel has asked to bring her school work and to keep in contact with me as her tutor." 

"Of course." Khasinau turned an interested gaze on the girl for the first time. Her resemblance to her mother was unmistakable, if understated. The same posture and facial features.  "What do you want to be, Izabel, when you grow up?" he asked, putting an unfamiliar softness into his tone.  

"I'm going to be a doctor," the girl replied, staring him full in the face as she stood up from the chair. 

Khasinau swallowed down a surge of irrational hatred. 

It was Jack Bristow's eyes that stared at him as she extended her left hand to him. 

Izabel would always bear a constant reminder of her true linage. 

Alexander Khasinau would be the only one affected by this sole truth, in an already spinning web of lies.   

He silently resolved this as he smiled and took her hand.


	4. Chapter Three

AN: Sorry about the delay all I can say is Bio exams seriously suck on top of major writer's block. I hope you enjoy this chapter :-) you know the drill R&R please? AN2 It is entirely possible that I have mixed up the timeline. Izabel was born 4/7/81 approx 8 months after 'Laura' dies.  
  
As always huge thanks to my readers both at SD1 and ff.net and of course GG and Ducks  
  
Special dedication: To Gabs for loving Irina almost as much as I do  
  
Chapter 4- In shadows  
  
Unknown location-Europe 21 May 1988  
  
"The number you have dialled has been disconnected, please hang up and try again"  
  
The woman on the other end of the line had no intention of trying again. In fact she didn't even know what had spurred her impulsive desire to phone that number, much less on an unsecured line among strangers. The bar was thick with smoke and heavy with the smell of tobacco smoke and that probably would have offended her in a previous life. The patrons making lurid semi serious passes at the brown haired stunner would have certainly been discouraged most strenuously but now, Irina Derevko welcomed the uncomplicated ignorant attention. Like everything her presence among the drunks had a purpose.  
  
The barest hint of a smile caught at maroon coloured lips. The whispered comments about her being a 'seductress' and 'true mistress' while being true also held an element of falsehood. None of her admirers, at lest those who thought beyond their libidos, would consider her an adequate candidate to hold a master's degree in English literature or to be a mother. It would never cross the minds of the more ambitious that the object of their attention could easily overpower them without the slightest energy expenditure.  
  
Shakespeare's paradoxical theme of appearance verses reality. The story of her adult life.  
  
Her hammerless reflections were interrupted with the arrival of her contact. The balding man was evidentially had prior knowledge for he sat down putting a very respectful, fear driven space between them.  
  
"Miss Derevko?" the man radiated fear and Irina's well-trained eye could see the hammering pulse underneath his dishevelled clothing.  
  
"Have you got the formulae?" she asked putting down her untouched wine glass.  
  
"No.if I could just have a little more time"  
  
"Mr. Smith you have already been given a two week extension my superiors will be most displeased with this further delay". The man stiffened in terror but to his credit did nothing more to try her precariously thin patience. It was clear that he feared Irina's retribution far more then any unknown elements.  
  
"You have a daughter?"  
  
Smith nodded  
  
"What is her name?"  
"Jacqueline, please don't hurt her!" the choked strangled sob had no effect on her contrary to the scientist desperate hope unbeknownst to him it was the name of his daughter, a completely random event that had a far greater effect on his excuser.  
  
Irina blinked rabidly the next scathing comment hitched in her throat fleetingly overwhelmed by memories.  
  
**  
  
Bristow Residence 1980 -two weeks before 'Laura' dies  
  
"Jack, are you alright honey?"  
  
Standing at the door to Sydney's room Laura Bristow smiled with disturbingly real tenderness. The scene before her was idyllic, so far removed from her on childhood experience. Her husband was sitting in the well -used rocking chair in the corner of the pastille coloured room. Sydney was cradled in his arms. The chair had been a gift from Gladys Bristow, Jack's grandmother, who had evidently gotten over her intense resentment towards his wife. Every aspect part of the room represented a cherished child, right to the unicorn embroiled tapestry above the bed or the extensive collection of battered books in the many shelves.  
  
"She's so amazing" Jack whispered reverently.  
  
"I know" Irina replied softly. Moving silently across the room she crouched down and clasped Jack's hand.  
  
"Sydney's almost as beautiful as her mother"  
  
"Sweet talker" she teased lifting Sydney and transferring into her bed, the girl instinctively nuzzled closer to her but remained undisturbed.  
  
"What's wrong?" Irina asked again. Of course she already knew, having memorized the content of his briefcase two hours ago.  
  
"Bad day at work" he replied, wrapping an arm around her waist pulling her to him. "I love you so much" it had taken her six months to stop inwardly wincing at the words or how willing this astute man played into her illusion. If she'd wanted to she could have stolen his considerable wealth, just as his relatives feared. Equally she could have destroyed the lives of those same people.  
  
She would have had it been on profile.  
  
"Come, let me see if I can make it seem just a little better" She murmured huskily, leading him towards their bedroom.  
  
It struck Irina Derevko suddenly. That everything she had spent years painstakingly creating were to be analysed and dissected with clinical remoteness. In 14 days Laura Bristow and everything that she had embodied would for all intents and purposes cease to exist. Leaving behind two people genuinely grieving for a fictitious character.  
  
Of whom she was author  
  
She felt tears catch hard in her throat but Irina had long since learnt to skilfully manipulate the sound into a gasp of pleasure as Jack gently but forcefully guided her to the bed. With a familiarity she never expected her husband's calloused hands roamed her willing body. Jonathon Bristow may have been naïve with no sense of self-preservation but he was a talented lover.  
  
Alexander expected her to report in at 2200. For once her multilevel existence culminated into a single being, to put it emotively. The pleasure felt by Laura could not be distinguished from her own. The normally impeccable sense of urgency faded into insignificance along with her superior's drilled instructions. All she could do was feel. Craving with helpless desperation to create a lasting impression on the man who would soon grieve for her death.  
  
Instead of instigating casual work related conversation as ordered the KGB agent allowed her body to be used. Jack's body language was such that Irina knew he was seeking refuge in the one place he felt safe.  
  
With the one person he should have most feared.  
  
**  
  
Irina gave no outward indication of her thoughts or their unrelated content then again the man before her viewed every gesture as life threatening, she doubted he would be analysing them particularly closely.  
  
"You have 48 hours and I strongly recommend you don't exceed that timeframe" she interjected tonelessly. To her relief and professional pride the brief stirrings of compassion Smith had unintentionally invoked, were short lived. Irina envisioned with clinical detachment the steps necessary to secure the collateral.  
  
The mistake did not enter the equation.  
  
"Go" she said with giving the grovelling man a second glance.  
  
Irina Derevko did not believe in fate. To believe in fate implied that an individual had little to no control over his or her existence, which equated to weakness, something that somebody in her position could ill afford. In spite of this firmly held philosophy no rational explanation was forthcoming as to why she did not eliminate all evidence of the child. Possible pregnancy hadn't even occurred to her during or after the event. This oversight alone was unforgivable. When coupled with her next actions it made her seem like an impossibly weak sentimental 'American'  
  
She had been unable to kill the child growing within her.  
  
Fate was a pathetic justification.  
  
It was the only on she had. 


	5. Chapter 4

Chapter Five: Tener Refragatio Phase one: Recruitment  
  
Kincaid Residence-central Moscow 4 July 1994  
  
She was doing it again.  
  
He had yet figure out how Izabel managed to mimicked behaviour patterns of parent's she'd never met.  
  
It went against the natural laws of inheritance. In his weaker moments he'd be convinced that it was fate's way of driving him insane  
  
Alexander Khasinau took pains to conceal the rebuke that threatened to escape his tightly pressed lips. It was disturbing for him to realize that his career, heavily reliant on meticulous foresight, could be potentially jeopardized by trivial factors. Alexander knew, had known for sometime that his feelings regarding Irina did not quiet equate to what they should represent, a simple uncomplicated business deal together with not entirely unexpected physical gratifications.  
  
By the same token what he felt for Irina's offspring, should be equally uncomplicated, he would never allow something so pathetic as sentiment cloud his judgement. The child standing before him was a business investment, the profitable product of careful planning combined with strategic manipulation.  
  
Watching the teenager work diligently at her studies evoked a fierce assortment of emotions within him. Izabel studious posture only served to heighten her resemblance to Bristow, to both sides of her lineage. Alexander considered himself a reluctant expert on all things even remotely connected to the man, right down to the nervous gesture his daughter was unconsciously emulating.  
  
If asked Khasinu could easily recite a chronological list of Jonathon 'Jack' Bristow's childhood pets.  
  
There were two things in the world Khasinau bothered to hate.  
  
American society and Jack Bristow, the two things were practically synonymous which made the task of exacting revenge so much sweater.  
  
And the catalyst that much more powerful  
  
At 13, Izabel Kincaid bore little physical resemblance to the half staved orphan he had discovered 5 years ago. Long lithe limbs were etched with firm muscle development and her naturally pale skin was flushed with a healthy glow that stood testament to her not so typical Russian living standards. The blooming maturity of her willowy frame was disguised under bagging clothing. Fawn coloured hair was in a messy plait just past her waist, physically she was beautiful with her mother's natural grace. Keen intelligence and an almost insatiable thrust for knowledge were central to everything the girl attempted, something he found gratifying and professionally promising but at the same time, more then a little disconcerting.  
  
"You can stop now," He said tonelessly  
  
Izabel looked up " you realize that it's my birthday right?" she said wearily, handing the sheets over to him before standing up to stretch.  
  
"Yes" Alexander said shortly, leafing through the pages methodically. These final test results would double as his final submission to the committee. Attaching such importance to a single subject did not come without risks but he was confident in her performance.  
  
"You're mean Christopher, I should be enjoying myself, celebrating another fun filled year of living"  
  
Alexander remained unaffected "The pre admission scholarship programme for Moscow College of Medicine is holding its last rounds of applications, you will still be turning one year older next year"  
  
"Won't you need Papa's signature for that?" Izabel asked hopefully, tucking a strained of fawn coloured hair behind her ear.  
  
Her adoptive father was away doubtlessly paying of same of his rapidly mounting debts. Marco Kincaid was fond of the drink, too fond. A common enough problem in the hard times but it became a problem if you were wealthier then most but had to work to maintain such status. Unlike a large percentage of the population Marco had every intention and the means to attain his finer desires, which included but weren't limited to fine woman.  
  
" He's still away on business" the euphonium was about 4 or 5 years out of date.  
  
Izabel wasn't disappointed, in order to be disappointed you really needed to be expecting something to begin with, which she wasn't. She had read or heard somewhere that little girls were supposed to hold their fathers to impossibly high standards putting them on proverbial pedestals  
  
That must be for the kids who didn't grow up expecting nothing and receiving barely more then that. She saw and accepted Marco for who he was nothing more nothing less. They had a loving though mutually ambivalent relationship. It didn't long to work out the fasted way into his good books was to stay out of the way of his drinking buddies.  
  
"Can I go and see mama?" Izzy asked knowing with instinctive confidence that she had passed the test.  
  
Alexander nodded briskly  
  
**  
  
"We are already years behind the American initiative, we need action now!"  
  
The harshly accented Russian voice rung out in the dimly lit room, it also went largely unheeded for the six men had been auguring the same points fruitlessly for hours. The smells of various vices, principally Cuban tobacco hung stale in the air.  
  
"The facility is skeletal at best. Upgrades still run the rest of being tracked" A man with a perpetual tick spoke up.  
  
"It's been 7 years since founding approval, what level of incompetence had we been hiring?" the same voice queried  
  
The personal barb was petty but the younger man was just tired enough to rise to the bait. The others in the room seemed equally apathetic towards resolution or productivity and were roused only slightly by the prospect of a verbal spar.  
  
"Enough!" the grating voice of the committee director was still powerful and drew the attention of everyone around the conference table.  
  
"We've been justifying the delay the investors with words like potential and strategic value. That's not what they're paying for. Results will be needed before the next Geneva Conference"  
  
Here the snow haired man fixed his gaze on each one of them "Contact Khasinu I want to run Sim 111 before deciding any further"  
  
**  
  
He would actually missed this alias  
  
The hardened veteran of Russian espionage prepared for his final performance as the shadowy patricidal figure of the Kincaid family. In each hand respectively was a bottle of Marco's favourite whisky and a bouquet of the flowers his wife had a characterizing weakness for, just another far from innocent sign of his involvement.  
  
Walking up the familiar path he meticulously planned out the stages in his head while maintaining an air of casualness. "Christopher" was never in the neighbourhood long enough to invoke suspicion in the high socio economic gossip driven community.  
  
The door was opened and his was granted entrance by Marie Kincaid the woman was lean and practical where her husband was impractical and glutinous. He offered the roses and they were taken gracefully  
  
"Dinner's on the table" she said be way of welcome a sign of his place within the household  
  
She would never know the mistake it would be  
  
She had served her purpose so Alexander resigned himself not care to as he made his way intimately around her prized kitchen and commented on the tantalizing smells. He didn't wince as he traced imaginary sniper tertiary along her proud spine or calculated the likelihood of unexpected collateral.  
  
All while keeping complacent smile on his face.  
  
**  
  
They had been a part of her for as long as she could remember.  
  
Isabel tried to appear calm and unaffected as she sat at the long oak table in the middle of the kitchen. She had learned long ago that any mention of the things she had eventually termed visions were met with hostility particularly when you lived in Russian Orthodox household.  
  
Visions were for homeless, toothless gypsies  
  
The same people she step over on the way to mass every Sunday, any potential social conscience was interrupted by her mother's suddenly too firm hand clenching the coat of Izabel's church best and guiding her away.  
  
She never had a 'real' vision more like a heightened sense of awareness, making instincts a little more reliable.  
  
Invisible pinpricks of were choreographing their way down the teenager's spine. A familiar mixture of Coriander and Basal suddenly burned her nostrils and her heart rate seemed to be caught between stopping completely and beating faster then a Hummingbird's wing, the resulting sensation was making her dizzy and Izabel's stomach was caught in a vice like grip.  
  
Something was wrong. Every fibber in her body screamed it.  
  
Izabel tried to focus on her mother as she laid the traditional roast out on the table, a mist a sea of compliments.  
  
"Christopher, would you say grace please?" Marco asked from his position at the head of the table.  
  
"We pray thee oh Lord"  
  
He was halfway through the verse when it happened. The first thing Izabel noticed was the red stain on her father's silk shirt. She was waiting for his string of annoyed curses when the widow shatter under the force of an unknown projectile, broken glass showered them. There was a cacophony of sound bur she couldn't connect anything that happened.  
  
Marie Kincaid, who had half raised to tend to her husband, was struck clearly in the chest with a sickening finite sound. Her ever-graceful body crumpled like a rug doll back into the chair, she made a terrible gurgling sound.  
  
Izabel's scream was struggled and pawed uselessly at the glass filled air. Watching the prone for her parents she could figure out what to do. Her ears rung she was unable to move or even hear her own sobs. The decision was taken away from her; Christopher moved with lightening speed and yanked her hard to the floor. Izabel was useless, her limbs failed and she lost her battle with nausea. The dry retching combined with heaving sobs to effectively immobilize her diaphragm. She was suddenly very cold and trembled violently.  
  
Alexander swore as he hurled Izabel out of house into the front yard. Reaching into his pocket he removed a bottle and tipped the contents onto his handkerchief. He clenched it firmly across her mouth. It took a minute for her to go completely limp. Picking her up the agent bundled her into the awaiting car with its black tined widows.  
  
**  
  
"Oh God!"  
  
Izabel half sobbed as she woke, unfortunately having no blissful period of ignorance before reality struck. She had a vague feeling of motion but couldn't fathom anything beyond that. Her head felt like cotton wool and her sight was restricted to shapeless colours  
  
"Christopher?" she whispered frantically  
  
"I hear little one, go back to sleep" Alexander said, finding extremely ironic that she found comfort in his presence.  
  
Izabel only response was to quietly mummer "Mummy" and "Daddy" over and over with the occasional intermittence of "why?" At one point her pulled the car over and pulled her into his arms, rocking her back and forth.  
  
Deepening the deception by promising to always be there for her.  
  
Alexander Khasnau saw no real point in maintaining the identity except the hopelessly vulnerable look in her every gesture. It almost tugged at what little remained of his heartstrings  
  
A feminine immature carbon copy of Bristow, during his first days in solitary sat beside him. He had never seen Irina that weak but then again he hadn't seen many sides to his former charge.  
  
For an unexplained reason both ideas gave him equal amounts of satisfaction.  
  
Reality would be upon her soon enough  
  
If Izabel had been alert she would have seen the man she so clung to methodically peel away earplugs and move around uncomfortably in his carefully concealed bullet -proof vest.  
  
If Izabel had been even vaguely conscious she would witness him exchange money with a man in camouflage gear, holding a gun.  
  
She would have overhead him arranging the elimination or bribing of people in on the immediate parameter to their house.  
  
As it was Izabel, in a drug induced haze slept away whatever remained of her innocence. 


End file.
